Here are some photos of some first time bloom henryi type seedlings from this past season. I am working on black hearted aurelians and some lily friends had kindly given me seed to add to my breeding program from some of their years of work. Actually many people from around the world were involved in these seedlings. I guess when you think about it if you have a hybrid seedling from existing hybrids you already are looking at some work from others. So thanks to all of those as well.
Jim in Saskatoon

The black hearts are nice, Jim. A very nice trait to be working on.

Nice ones, all of them. What did you pollenate these with last summer (or) what are your goals working forward with these. Pictures 3, 4, and 7 in particular.

Lorn,
I used some of the pollen of number 4 on my 'Eye of the Tiger' pictured here. I have a few seedling coming up now.

This is a sibling of 'Eye of the Tiger'.

I plan on crossing both 'Eye of the Tiger' and its sibling to this new seedling from this past year . It has wider tepals and a whiter background colour - probably overall the best blackheart seedling from last season.

Gorgeous Jim

OK. I think that's a good move, Jim. I think this offspring will show a little more red in it. I think by making it a little more complex, it will provide for much more colors potential in future crossing. I suppose you will then introduce a Trumpet form parent to get a sunburst form. What I've been doing is once I have a good henryi cross based largely on the colors that I see in the heart and throat, I'll go directly to a selected Trumpet, again based on color and make the cross. For instance, I would have pollenated pictures 3 and 4 at this point with a dark purple Trumpet in hopes of getting more red with uniform release. So, your post turned out to be pretty valuable to me. Thanks!. This summer I'll do a few early henryi and rosthorni crosses with one additional crossing before proceeding.

Lovely, lovely, lovely.

Lorn, by starburst form do you mean more two dimensional or a flatter more open form like this seedling?
I think it would be very interesting to get the red colour into these henryi type lilies.

A few more first time bloom blackhearted seedlings.

Wow! That last group are even more lovely!

Thanks Della,
Are you doing any work with the henryi types or blackhearts?

JimSaskatoon said:Lorn, by starburst form do you mean more two dimensional or a flatter more open form like this seedling?
I think it would be very interesting to get the red colour into these henryi type lilies.

Jim, at least to the form of these and possibly a little more bowl shape with recurved petal tips, not reflexed petal tips. Now, when I look at these, I don't see much of a shade of red in the heart. In fact, the yellow/greens present that these have are in the other half of the color spectrum. The potential for red is always there to some extent in these, but not at high enough levels to be visible. So, if some more red is desired in the three you show, it would most likely have to come from a donor pollen.

Now, one thing I always do when making crosses such as we're discussing is to take a real good look at the heart and throat in daylight. I dissect them in two directions and examine them with a magnifying glass, just to see what colors I see to be present. So if we back up to the previous set of seven pictures you posted, pictures 3 and 4, I think I can see quite a few shades possible of the 43 in the red/purple group. These , then would become my choices for introducing red to the three whites. But in doing so, a dominant orange shade would also be introduced, most likely an apricot/orange. It would be the cat's meow to have pollen of a nice white with a black heart that reflects a lot of red/purple shades right about now.

Lorn, would love to hear more about these possible 43 shades, and I really had never imagined going to such lengths to examine the colours, but sounds like a great method! Mind you... could I bring myself to dissect my seedling flowers.... I'm working on being tougher though. I even disbudded something this year!

Jim, I'm just building up my henryi thing and blackheart collection thanks to seed from many generous growers and from the exchanges. For most of my lily growing I've concentrated on pendant asiatics. I love them and they were the easiest to grow and transport in pots around my various rented homes. A couple of years ago I moved to an acre and now I that I have more room I have undergone something like a lily explosion.

So! Now I am very interested in finding new colours and ridiculously abundant whiskers on recurved and reflexed aurelian and OT stuff.

dellac said:Lorn, would love to hear more about these possible 43 shades, and I really had never imagined going to such lengths to examine the colours, but sounds like a great method! Mind you... could I bring myself to dissect my seedling flowers.... I'm working on being tougher though. I even disbudded something this year!

Well, what else do you think a maiden bloom is good for, just to stand there and look at? Might as well get some good out of it --you're going to disbud it anyway, save the pollen maybe. Talk to Jeffrey Boden about what he looks for when examining either of the darker black or green hearts There are clues to be interpreted deep in there by the older pro's, even more than color. And I just started building my own color associations based on what I see in the heart a couple years ago.

And, yes, there are 43 named shades of red and 'crimson' as in Ed McRae's Crimson Pixie happens to be just one of them.

Roosterlorn said:

Well, what else do you think a maiden bloom is good for, just to stand there and look at?

Crossing, of course! Lots and lots of crossing!

Might as well get some good out of it --you're going to disbud it anyway, save the pollen maybe. Talk to Jeffrey Boden about what he looks for when examining either of the darker black or green hearts There are clues to be interpreted deep in there by the older pro's, even more than color. And I just started building my own color associations based on what I see in the heart a couple years ago.

I'm always amazed how much more there is to learn.

And, yes, there are 43 named shades of red and 'crimson' as in Ed McRae's Crimson Pixie happens to be just one of them.

Ahh - I'm guessing you mean the RHS colour chart, then? That's on my wish list. One day!

Lots of information and things to think about, Lorn. I will have to look for a dark red/purple trumpet for sure. Also, I will give a closer look at some cross sections of these flowers especially on those whites with the red centres.
I wondered when I saw a couple asiatic seedlings bloom this year if it was SORT OF the same thing happening as that which happens in the black hearted aurelians. With these asiatic seedlings (one pictured below) which have green hearts and then develop red over the green as the flower ages giving what appears to be a black heart. I did cross two similar seedlings just to see what their seedlings would give - more black hearted seedlings??